The U.S. Court of Military Commission Review, created by last year's Military Commissions Act of 2006, has issued a ruling reversing a lower military commission judge who refused to assert jurisdiction over Gitmo detainees charged by the U.S. I don't have any time right now to analyze this, but here is the decision, United States v. Khadr, hot off...
For those of you not blessed (or cursed) to live in the New York area, you may not have noticed the chorus of local outrage over Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's request to visit "Ground Zero", the site of the former World Trade Center in New York during his attendance at the U.N. General Assembly opening session next month. I actually...
Chapman lawprof John Hall has a curious op-ed in the WSJ (subscription required) attacking the Cambodia hybrid war crimes court. He calls it "another U.N. corruption scandal in the making." But this is really unfair to the U.N. (and when was the last time I wrote that sentence, maybe never?) Professor Hall is really arguing that the problem with...
An arbitral tribunal set up according to Annex VII of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea made public a judgment yesterday settling a border dispute between Guyana and Suriname involving an oil-rich underwater basin (full judgment here). A Canadian oil company, CGX, had been exploring the basin only to be expelled by Surinamese gunboats back in...
I've long suggested that the ICC arrest warrants in Darfur will likely be forgotten or abandoned in favor of pursuing a comprehensive peace deal for Darfur. Earlier this week, Kevin pointed out U.N. Secretary General Ban-ki Moon did privately raise the issue of outstanding ICC arrest warrants for alleged Sudanese war criminals during his visit to Sudan. But...
A disgruntled Belgian subject has decided to put up the Kingdom of Belgium for sale on Ebay. But watch out. It comes with a $300 billion debt. ...
China announced today it has requested consultations with the United States over the imposition of U.S. duties on certain Chinese paper products. This is WTO-speak for: "We're filing a lawsuit". This marks the first time China has ever used the WTO dispute settlement procedures on its own (it joined in Europe's suit against the U.S. steel tariffs). ...
Judging from the comments Professor John McGinnis's posts received, many of you had strong (if not always positive) reactions to his ideas. This is a sign, of course, that John is a natural blogger. We want to thank him for his participation and hope to welcome him back to visit in the future. Thanks, John! ...
I wanted to briefly comment on John's most recent post, and his very interesting essay, since it suggests an emerging consensus among legal conservatives about the Bush Administration's war on terror legal strategies (see also Ken Anderson's writings here). As both John and Jack Goldsmith seem to be arguing, the Administration's problems were mostly a failure of political strategy...
Opinio Juris is very pleased to welcome Professor John McGinnis of Northwestern University School of Law as a guest-blogger for the next few days. Professor McGinnis is a well-known scholar of constitutional and international law. Among his recent publications is this Stanford Law Review (with Ilya Somin) article examining the democratic legitimacy of international lawmaking. In...
The Institute for War and Peace Reporting notes that there is an emerging political consensus against supporting ICC efforts in Darfur.Escalating violence in Darfur and efforts by the international community to restore peace has dominated the news headlines this month. Particularly prominent has been coverage of the first visit by the new UN secretary-general to the region and his thoughts on...
A federal judge yesterday lifted a stay he had placed earlier in the week on Noriega's extradition to France. In his brief written opinion, Judge Hoeveler held that France's agreement to give Noriega the same treatment as a POW that was provided by the U.S. is enough to satisfy any Geneva Convention concerns. In other words, France does...
